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Wednesday, December 21, 2016

New York antiquities dealer Nancy
Wiener has been charged with three felony counts by the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. A pre-arraignment deposition was
given today, and bail was set at a combination of $25,000 bond plus $25,000 cash.A charge begins the criminal court process. It is not a
finding of guilt. A defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty beyond
a reasonable doubt.In March, Homeland Security
Investigations (HSI) in partnership with the Manhattan District Attorney’s
Office seized Asian artifacts from the Nancy
Weiner’s Gallery on Manhattan’s East Side during Asia Week, one of the city's
leading art and cultural events. HSI and another Immigration and Customs
Enforcement Agency, US Customs and Border Protection, had been working on their
long-running investigation dubbed Operation Hidden Idol ahead of Asia
Week, confiscating a number of artifacts originating from Asia that authorities
concluded were illegal.The Chasing Aphrodite blog reports the factual allegations of the
Wiener case. CHL will offer a thumbnail sketch of the law based on publicly
available records published by the New York State Unified Court System.Wiener faces three felony offenses.
They include

The most serious charge is criminal
possession of stolen property (CPSP) in the first degree. The statute recites
that “a person is guilty of criminal possession of stolen property in the first
degree when he knowingly possesses stolen property, with intent to benefit
himself or a person other than an owner thereof or to impede the recovery by an
owner, and when the value of the property exceeds one million dollars.” The
offense is punishable by up to 25 years in prison.

Readers of the CHL blog know that
state law prosecutions of cultural property dealers have certain advantages. In New York, there
is the presumption described in NY PL § 165.55 that “a person in the business
of buying, selling or otherwise dealing in property who possesses stolen
property is presumed to know that such property was stolen if he obtained it
without having ascertained by reasonable inquiry that the person from whom he
obtained it had a legal right to possess it.”

Moreover, there is no defense that
the person who actually stole the property may not have been identified or
convicted; no defense that the charged defendant had no part in the actual
theft; and no defense that the theft may have happened outside the boundaries of
New York.

Interestingly, the incident date of
one or more of the charges against Wiener is December 20, 1999, according to
court records. A crime that occurred 17 years ago may present legal and factual
challenges to the prosecution.

The case is docketed at
2016NY073118.Errata 12/23/16: State court records show that Wiener was indicted. CHL now has obtained the prosecution's charging document. It is a complaint, not an indictment, and this blog post has been updated to reflect this current information.

Text and original photos
copyrighted by Cultural Heritage Lawyer, a blog commenting on matters of
cultural property law, art law, cultural heritage policy, antiquities
trafficking, and museum risk management. Blog url: culturalheritagelawyer.blogspot.com.
Any unauthorized reproduction or retransmission of any blog post without the
express written consent of CHL is prohibited. CHL is a service of Red
Arch Cultural Heritage Law & Policy Research, Inc.

2015 ABA Journal Blawg 100 Honoree

2014 ABA Journal Blawg 100 Honoree

2014 Daniel Webster International Lawyer of the Year award given to Rick St. Hilaire

"Rick St. Hilaire, who has become an authority on cultural heritage law, received the International Law Section’s 2014 Daniel Webster International Lawyer of the Year award at an Oct. 30 reception in Manchester, hosted by Sheehan Phinney Bass + Green." - NH Bar News, November 19, 2014

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Rick St. Hilaire is among those featured in Josh Knelman's book, Hot Art

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